EaglesEye379

User Score
7.0

Presentation - 8.0
Gameplay - 7.0
Value - 7.0

Crackdown is an action adventure sandbox-style game, set within a island-based city called Pacific City represented in 3 different map areas. You start off with the mission of 'cleaning up the city', taking the role of a super-cop with superior genetic ability to heal and cloning technology from your employers 'The Agency' which allows you to respawn at the nearest Supply Point. These Supply Points act as savepoints which you claim as territory to restock your ammo, recharge your health an also to travel to other Supply Points - so its really a save/warp/reload point. If you die during the game, you start at your last saved Supply Point. 

This makes the game fairly easy, even though the game starts you off with the lowest amount of abilities. The main abilities are driving (upgraded by running over baddies and finishing race mini-games), shooting (upgraded by shooting baddies), explosives (upgraded by killing baddies using rockets or grenades), jumping (or agility, upgraded by collecting the 500 orbs strewn across the whole city), and hand-to-hand combat (upgraded by kicking/throwing baddies). These abilities can be leveled up to a 5-star rating maximum and you will experience the true way to play this game once you are at least 4-star across these abilities. Too bad that you will probably reach this level after you finish the campaign. Its worth noting that you get the option from the start of obtaining vehicles from 'The Agency' which are upgraded (and they look really good once they are!) as your driving ability levels up. You will feel like a god once you are streaming down Pacific City in a maxed out Agency Supercar!

The enemies in the game which you are supposed to 'clean up' are split into 3 gangs - Los Muertos (Mexican influence), Volk (Russian influence) and Shai-Gen (Chinese influence). However, there is hardly any difference between them besides some different weapons/vehicles between them and the boss battles are way too similar to one another. The difficulty comes only when there are a massive amount of enemies around you and to actually find the route to get to the boss (as all you get is a point on your minimap). Your shields and health recharges and its not difficult to run and jump away for cover if they get too low.

The plot is very thin - although the narrator is good and the city does feel alive and not empty. These is a small twist at the end which I will not spoil which could lead to more evidence of a sequel. Presentation-wise, the game has a nice cel-shaded art style and there is a co-op feature so you can play with a friend over Xbox Live.

The game can be extended by cranking up the difficulty setting (there are 3 levels) and by playing the mini-games (racing and jumping). Once you finished the campaign and got rid of all the gangs, you have the option of 'resurrecting' the gangs - like a reset button which will reset all the gangs including the bosses. Also, the Achievements are very well thought out and one of the best in any game. There are also time trials of killing bosses, and an 800 MS points DLC which gives you another batch of Races called Street Races, a new vehicle and new weapons - seems really pricey to me. 

So in the end, I feel Crackdown could have been much more but it was fun while it lasted. It succeeded in adding much more visceral action to the GTA formula but was a little shallow - like GTA in long stretchy thin pants. It was over too soon and I feel the idea could have been developed and extended better. I will still recommend it as a great adventure game, especially if you like games like GTA and Saints Row.

Crackdown was created by Realtime Worlds which is led by David Jones, the founder of the Grand Theft Auto series. The game is published by Microsoft Games Studios.